I am so sick of the roller coaster in my mind. Last night, without warning depression crashed into my brain. No premonition... No easing into it... No seeing it approaching from a safe distance... Crash. Tears leaked from my eyes and an embarrassment washed over me because I knew I was minutes away from melting completely away from functionality and into the coiled ball of inadequacy that takes over far too often for my liking. I thought I was out of the cycle. I thought I had some added responsibilities to care for... A few more friends checking in on me and needing me... But last night I wanted nothing more than the world to turn to blackness while I sunk into the hole I haven't quite become yet comfortable. I did some of the things I do to trick my brain into thinking that I can make it through the depression or at least through to the next day. Maybe it's just exhaustion, even though i did nothing unusual? I walked the dog in the moonlight and even took deep breaths to smell the moisture in the air from an impending rainstorm. It's okay to be sad when it rains, isn't it? And then at home again, it was all I could do to wipe away the tears and climb beneath the blankets to sleep a heavy slumber, hoping I heard the alarm in the morning. This morning I woke with a headache and had a revelation that my migraine cycle may be parallel to my wave of anxiety and depression, but felt defeated knowing I haven't got it in me to keep track of anything when I'm sinking into the hole. I got an email with some positive notes on a writing job and I even said the words, I feel positive about this one and know it's going to good when it is complete. The sun was shining, but not enough to make me squint. There was a slight breeze in the air. It was a comfortable day all around. It was an excruciating day. I felt like my silent sobs were growing heavier each second I was awake. Anger is a problem when I'm in the lower wave - my fuse is shorter. I tried to keep from situations that would provoke any degree of cussin' and fussin'. And through all this careful treading today, I feel my shaky chest and waterworks are on the ready in my tear ducts. I can feel it waiting to explode like that erratic volcano on the other side of the island from which folks live in constant fear, but also mock and allow to be the punchline of jokes. That's my depression. That's my blackness. I counted down the hours until I could hide behind a locked door again. I'd like to have a friend who understands and just sits in the blackness with me like a pal in a movie theatre watching another's tragic tale instead of living my own. I can't be normal today in the least. Nothing is of more value than the integrity of one's brain and when mine is faulty, the stressors of reality are irrelevant. I knew this boy who had gone through some pretty crappy days. (divorce, losing his kid, getting hurt on his job, swindled out of money and out of his things...) He always had a smile for me. He always had a smile for everyone. So when he was encouraging me to get through one more day, he shared that he was clinically depressed and medicated and some days it was all he could do from shutting himself away from everyone and everything and he had known the isolation of the black hold of unreasonable sorrow. Then how is a smile on his face? Where does he hold this store of sunshine he can let beam from his eyes when black clouds surround others? He told me very plainly, "It's not you, or her or him... Why can't I smile at you?" His secret was division. He could separate his emotional depression from the physical acts of others. If I said good morning, his brain considered it could be? I recently met this girl who I've come to find out is not treated very well at home or at work. I don't know her mental health diagnosis - Maybe this is the measure of a well adjusted young lady? She truly lives with the actions to treat others as she wants to be treated. But this goes a step further than the archaic rules of chivalry that we all want but never admit that we need. It's more than holding a door open or asking if a beverage is needed. It's truly an understanding of the madness surrounding others. She puts aside her discomfort so that she can explain to herself and others that although this kook is behaving in a most offensive way, there must be a reason they do not conform to the niceties they should have learned before pre-school. We all have eccentricities - some are chemical imbalance, and others are behavioral. I refer to those people who don't have the manners with which I was raised or the sense they should have been given labeled common as "let them eat cake". I suppose I could make that more clear with less words - maybe even call them Marie Antionette's? They just don't know differently. And on days like today when I'm clobbered by the depression; not even sinking, I have the worst time remembering that others don't all have this incredible insight to intuit that I cannot be bothered with the trivialities of their concerns. It's much too hard to concentrate on breathing. And that is the crux of wanting to hide. It's the fear that I am not going to be around someone who understands that my brain is not letting me understand the importance of the nonsense. It's the fear that I won't be able to reason the amount of groceries in my cart versus the money in my pocket. And it's the complete lack of care for anything but getting to the sunset so that I can hide in the darkness even though that is the very thing I hate the most about the depression.